The whole game is the Slide/Furious Wind technique. You can pretty much hold the block button down while doing combat, then throw a Slide at the end or block/Furious Wind everything that happens. The enemies have high stamina, like the mages, Invisible Ninjas, grab happy giant enemies, but they can all be tagged by Steel On Bone, you just kind of have to do it indirectly. Regular ninjas, Soldier Ninjas, the Imp fiends, you can pretty much SOB as you see it, the other guys that tend to grab with their red hands you have to Slide out of the grab hitbox and SOB them from the side. Mages you might as well UT since you get a few more points, but otherwise you have to try and trip them with the slide, or Furious Wind their attacks and slide behind them until you do find an opening. Sliding into enemies is how you break open their defense, just try Sliding where they have to turn to hit you.
I dunno, there’s definitely different schools of though on how to manage enemies in NG2, but my main strategy in that was to dash near or around enemy groups, bait them into attacking, Furious Wind to another position, Go for a Delimb/OT chains over and over, and it works in this even better because the Slide can stagger or juggle the enemies. Even bosses like Elizabeth in NG2, I’d straight bulldog them by Furious Winding her attack strings and then just start hacking away cuz you recovered instantly at the end of it. It’s offense and defense wound into one move.
I haven’t had many problems De-limbing enemies in this, just depends on the enemy. Basic ninjas and soldiers are easy to get, higher damage enemies require longer more powerful combos, or a couple of series of strings. Once you see the enemy bloodied up, then go for delimbs, until then hammer then with stronger attack strings, then try Sliding at the end of the combo. I don’t have any issues with the slide’s recovery personally…
I agree the controls ain’t quite as tightly wound as they should be, but that’s a problem I’ve had with both Sigmas and NG3. Itagaki just made sure that shit was precise, these guys aren’t quite there yet. Least the bosses are less cheap than before, but yeah, the Final Boss and the Dinosaur are pretty awful, like Sigma 2’s “I’m actually fighting the Statue of Liberty” level of awful.
Otherwise I’m digging the game alot. Weapons are all great, and while there’s still some low quality moments of just bad design outside of the general combat, I think they brought it back pretty well.
Looks the the leaderboards for Story playthroughs is pretty much ruined, and probably Normal Chapter Challenge cuz of the Playthrough as the Girls achievement, but Master and Ultimate Chapter Challenge and Trials will still have some legit stuff.
@AlphaZero Do you prefer NGB and NGII over NGS/NGSII? If so, why?
I’d like to play the original NGII since I haven’t. The blood+real decaps+massive amount of enemies on screen VS NGSII makes it look really fun and more brutal in comparison. I need to borrow my nephews copy or something so I can play through the game and see the differences first-hand.
I like Black better than Sigma because I thought Sigma was a sloppy port personally. Controls weren’t as tight, and I thought Rachel’s bits hurt the flow of the game more than helped it. Visuals were nice, but I thought the flame effects across the board looked terrible, and there was just a general level of inconsistency about the game’s quality control. Black had everything worked out. It was more little things that annoyed me about Sigma, like the FMVs looking like shit and controls being a bit loose, as well as having boost ninpo power by shaking the controller(stupid)
I like quite a few of Sigma2’s design changes, the upgrading system paced things out a little more like Black, the Chapter Challenge, Bow and Arrow Sidestepping, fixing Mission Mode, and Emma’s Fang being a throwback to Dabi from Black. Visuals were okay, flame effects still sucked, but I didn’t think the game looked as consistently clean as NG2, even though it had higher resolution and all that. For every good thing they did, they did something stupid to counter it(lack of blood, still busted scoring, dumb boss additions)
NG2 is pretty broke in a lot of ways, but that’s part it’s charm for me. Itagaki said they never really got to balance the game, and that it was basically set to overdrive move as far as enemy behavior, but yeah the blood, dismemberment, enemy count just upped the intensity by a big degree, but there was a lot of enemy stuff that was savagely cheap. But by far the most intense entry in the series…if NGB only had NG2’s combat…
If I had to rate them by enjoyment…
1.NG2=/=NGB
2.NG3 Razor’s Edge(the package deal is the best of the series IMO, and I do really like this version)
3.Sigma 2
4.Sigma
5.NG3
Ninja Gaiden II is fucking awesome as long as you don’t go above like…hard. Even very hard is pushing it as that’ went he projectiles and explosions really start becoming a bother, they start really effecting the performance of the game, frame rate drops start becoming a real issue. On the lower diffs tho it’s still pretty damn challanging, and it’s a lot of fucking fun to play when it works right the way it’s intended to. There’s a TON of bullshit in that game tho, parts of the game that just fucking suck, like almost all of the Amazon stage is fucking ass.
Honestly the first half of Ninja Gaiden II is brilliant, and the second half is the exact opposite. After Russia the game just falls apart (And Russia’s not exactly pristine either).
Yeah, NG2 Chapter 8(Russia) and Chapter 9(Amazon) were pretty awful stalling points, but Chapter 10, where it’s literally raining blood and most of Chapter 11’s Hayabusa Village stuff before the cave bits were cool though, but it does get a bit disjointed the more Fiends are stacked against you as enemies. I actually really liked Mentor, the enemy layout had less rocket spam, just a ton of those Incendiary shitheads, but you could get stuck by one and Furious Wind out of the explosion. Furious Wind, I swear, most slept on mechanic in NG2/NG3
The raining blood stage is ok. I’m not really a fan of those skeleton snake things (I don’t remember their name). They are a real bitch to fight at times, especially when they are red in a level soaked in the color red. The Hayabusa Village to Mt. Fuji treak is actually really awesome, arguably the best set of stages in the game, you just got the TDS so it’s on, and the game brings it by throwing a lot of really great Spider Ninja fights at you. I think that was the high point of the game for me. I really like playing the first stage in Japan, NY, and Greece, and the Hayabusa Village to Mt Fiji climb are just great. Everything else is so balls tho. Bad bad bad. Airship level was incredibly shit to (Which is funny cuz the first game had a pretty damn good airship level) The game litterally falls apart when you get inside Mt Fuji and proceed to fight all the not so great bosses all over again, usually in far shittier circumstances then the fight prior. Like the fight with that flying son bitch from Russia you fight in the clock tower. they make you fight his ass again while surrounded by deep pools of lava. God damn. And Ninja Gaiden II has one of the worst last bosses of all time. That guy is dog shit.
Man like 50% of NGII is amazing and 50% of it awful.
Starting Ultimate Ninja now…damn lol, a bit more forgiving than vanilla 3 but pretty much 1 hit death on most stuff.
They really did a good job with the weapons on this one though, they’re all useful. Kusarigama Steel On Bone chains are pretty slick, drags the guys face first into the blade, Lunar just brutally beats the shit out of everything.
Just made Master Ninja my bitch. Came in 30th on the leaderboards with atleast the first 25 looking like glitchers. I can live with that.
Such a shame the leaderboards are such a mess already.
I tried your advice Alpha, but it didn’t work out for me. So I just said fuck it, full retard on offensive. And it actually worked out for me lol. I finally feel in control during the fights. I found the weapons that work the best for certain enemies and I finally found strings that pretty much guarantee delimbs. Having way more fun now compared to the first few days
If NG2 taught me anything it was spam UT, Izuna drop, flying swallow and ignore the rest. That’s basically a death sentence on this game. The other combo’s are really good and way more useful. And those charge strong attacks are way more useful than I thought.
Thank god it was just me being a dumbass instead of the game sucking dick. Guess I’ll get started on Ultimate Ninja tomorrow.
It really is fun, it’s mostly NG2’s combat but without the UT/Izuna spam reliance. I don’t wanna say I like it better than Gaiden 2(no tonfa), but it’s definitely far more balanced and there’s not many moments where you’re "Hope I never have to do that again"
like some of NG2’s stuff crotchpuncha and I were talking about. No dumb swimming sequences with exploding jellyfish lol.
Most of the enemies are counterparts to their NGB/NG2 versions, even the bosses. I like how the Chapter Challenges just cut out the dumb boss shit too, cuts out the Dinosaur chase scene from Story and you the final boss on Day 8 ends with Regent. They cut Canna’s giant form out completely lol.
Hopefully they’ll get everything in sync for Gaiden 4…
What was buggy about the Wii version? Never bothered with it. Don’t let Vanilla sway you though, I’ve been telling my friends who hated NG3 that it’s pretty much NG2 using NG3’s levels.
This game is fun, but I really wish Team Ninja would move away from their, “Throw as much shit on the screen as we possibly can” mindset. Especially when the camera isn’t at all designed to handle it. Having rockets, arrows, fireballs, whatever, constantly filling up the screen got old really fast.
I’d really like to see more emphasis on melee combat in the future, and enemies that aren’t only challenging because they have invincibility slapped on 90% of their animations.
Yeah, the projectile spam gets a bit old, but it’s strange how other action games copy it…even MGR has it’s rocket guy moments…
At least Team Ninja stepped up and admitted they really fucked up with NG3 vanilla instead of taking the “Well, gamers are just to dumb to understand what we were going for” like Bioware and Silicon Knights type of stuff.
By the way, what the hell is Itagaki up to? Devil’s Third is starting to feel like a vaporware title
Ultimate’s not too bad past the first level, probably died 10 times trying to sneak through that smoke scene and ghost kill everything since that Spidertank kills you so fast. SOB saves your ass so much in this version lol
The You Got Skills cheevo/trophy though…Unlock all skills with the girls and the Unknown Ninja…that’s level 99, Ultimate Ninja and Ultimate Ninja trials complete. That’s a grind.
Momiji though…on those trials with Marbius, Zedonius and Alma, any of the bosses that like to go airborne, you can use her double jump+X and just slice them right out of the air. Almost feels like payback.
These rockets are ridiculous. I thought that one dude was exaggerating a bit but I went and bought the game. Made it to chapter 2 and these damn dudes with the rockets and the helicopter are annoying. Don’t get me wrong, I handled it but still… Also I was defeated upon the first Test of Valor. Didn’t expect that boss. And I still hate the new health system. Unlocked my baby the Lunar Staff though. These kills are mad sexy.
Once you get the Falcon Eye upgrade for the arrow, you can Footstool Jump off the enemies and quick target rocket guys in the air to make 'em easier.
Steel on Bone chains recover health, but also buy that Meditation technique, you can earn back unrecoverable health by using whatever ninpo you have at the end of each battle. Comes in handy.
Lunar is awesome though, no Steel on Bone, but you can use it’s Obliterations the same way, see red hand attacks, hit Y for instant OT. Lunar raped most of the stuff on Master Ninja though, good crowd control shit.